Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Drug Prevention Network President, Chuck Doucette, spent many years with the RCMP working the DARE program (Drug Abuse Resistance Education), one of Canada's best and longest running prevention programs for and with school kids.

It was in that capacity that Chuck appeared last Wednesday on CKNW Radio.

You can hear that excellent conversation with Bill Good by going to the URL below:

http://www.cknw.com/news/audiovault/index.aspx

and selecting November 21 at 11am.

If you want to skip the short newscast, just slide the tracking bar along to 6:00 minutes and enjoy.

Friday, November 23, 2012

We used to fear Mary Jane, then we
laughed about her, and now many of us think she’s downright wholesome.
Marijuana’s public image has undergone a stunning transformation since the
scare-mongering of Reefer Madness and the dope comedies of Cheech and
Chong, but many doctors believe that weed’s rehabilitation as a virtual wonder
drug may be distracting us from its real health dangers.It seems that plenty of people have
bought the idea that marijuana is a harmless herb, or better. Stories
proclaiming the benefits of “medical marijuana” – for ailments as varied as
arthritis, MS, glaucoma and Alzheimer’s – abound in mainstream media like
International Business Times, and at patient support sites such as
Livestrong.org. Voters in Washington and Colorado recently approved measures to
begin legalizing pot, and a reinvigorated movement in B.C. is pushing for
similar changes. A poll in the summer showed that two-thirds of Canadians are
okay with decriminalizing weed for personal use.

Pot supporters promote its supposed
benefits at big trade shows like the Treating Yourself Expo, which celebrated
its third annual edition in May in Toronto. Doctors aren’t nearly so well
mobilized on the issue, but many say the health risks of smoking marijuana are
more extensive and better understood than ever before.

“There’s a pretty potent lobby that
makes claims about the medical benefits of cannabis, and anybody who disputes
them is labelled part of the war on drugs,” says Dr. Meldon Kahan, medical
director of the Substance Use Service at Women’s College Hospital in Toronto.
“But there’s no role, or hardly any role, for smoked cannabis in the treatment
of chronic pain. There are safer alternatives, such as cannabis in pill form or
inhalers. There are toxins in cannabis smoke that are carcinogens, and that
accelerate heart disease. Smoked cannabis is addicting, unsafe during pregnancy
and especially dangerous for young people, in terms of triggering psychosis,
depression and mood disorders.”

According to Health Canada, addiction
is a complex phenomenon that includes psychological cravings, difficulties in
controlling use, symptoms of withdrawal, and persistence in the addictive
activity even when it is obviously damaging one’s health, relationships and
day-to-day functioning. All can apply to heavy cannabis smokers, says Kahan.

Teens are still developing
neurologically, he says, which makes them more vulnerable than adults to the
adverse effects of marijuana, especially of the powerful strains for which B.C.
is famous. A recent report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences about a long-term study of more than 1,000 pot-using teens in New
Zealand said that those who continued smoking into their 30s suffered
significant cognitive deficits related to memory, reasoning and ability to
process information.

According to a 2007 report by Health
Canada, 8.2 per cent of young people use cannabis on a daily basis. Many teens
smoke weed to cope with the anxieties of adolescence, and find it very tough to
quit.“People who take cannabis regularly
get a mood-leveling effect,” Kahan says. “When they stop suddenly, there’s a
tremendous rebound anxiety that can go on for days or weeks, and that makes
them want to take it again.”

Many young users smoke it with
tobacco, a combo that researchers are finding to be much more addicting than
marijuana alone. Dr. Bernard Le Foll, a leading researcher at Toronto’s Centre
for Addiction and Mental Health, says his research shows that when nicotine and
tetrahydrocannabinol (or THC, the element in pot that delivers the “high”) are
received together, they magnify each other’s effects on brain chemistry.

A 2009 study at the University of B.C.
led by Dr. Wan Tan found “a significant synergistic effect between marijuana
smoking and tobacco smoking” that increases risk for chronic obstructive
pulmonary disease. COPD (which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis) can
aggravate the risk of pneumonia, heart problems, glaucoma and lung cancer.

John Westland, a social worker at the
Hospital for Sick Children’s Adolescent Substance Abuse Outreach Program, says
many of his teenaged patients combine weed and tobacco in the quick-hit form
known as “poppers” (not to be confused with the amyl nitrites inhaled at clubs
and raves). They use a modified water pipe that delivers a head rush they don’t
get from smoking straight marijuana.

“From my experience with my patients,
I would say the addiction potential is higher for sure,” Westland says. The
relative cheapness of poppers is also a draw, as is the societal notion that pot
is pretty much okay, and that a few cigarettes won’t hurt you. “As their
perception of risk goes down, use goes up,” Westland says. Withdrawal is an
ugly process that deprives jittery patients of sleep and appetite, he says, and
can drag on through cycles of relapse and repeated efforts.

So why is weed regarded as relatively
benign? How can any kind of smoking seem okay in 2012?

Pot’s current reputation has certainly
benefited from growing skepticism about established medicine. Marijuana is seen
as whole and natural, not a refined pharmaceutical produced by a big
corporation. Weed as a painkiller or treatment for nausea may appeal to the
same people who seek out herbal equivalents of pharmaceuticals such as Valium,
whose effects can be mimicked by valerian root.

Pot also benefits from current
demographics. In contrast to seniors of, say 20 years ago, aging boomers today
have fond memories of sharing a joint in their college dorm, and may not be
aware that today’s marijuana is probably much more potent than what they smoked
in ’68.

The widespread feeling that
prohibition has failed both users and society as a whole has also helped.
Surely a little pot smoking can’t be more harmful, say weed activists, than a
harsh legal regime that has cost us so much in money and damaged lives.

“Whatever people think the harms of
cannabis are, those are best reduced by a legally regulated system,” says Dana
Larsen, leader of a Sensible B.C. initiative to decriminalize weed in B.C. In
any case, he says, “The use of cannabis since the 1960s has pretty much
steadily risen in Canada, as has the severity of the laws, so the idea that
prohibition is doing anything to keep cannabis out of the hands of youth is
totally wrong.”

No doubt. What does work is
information. A 2011 survey report from the U.S. National Institute on Drug
Abuse found that while cannabis use is increasing among American high school
students, tobacco smoking has dropped by half since 1997. In those 15 years,
tremendous societal scorn has come down on smoking, the ill effects of which
are pictured on every cigarette pack. Marijuana, meanwhile, has acquired a
public image almost as benign as wheatgrass. Perhaps our long-running
relationship with Mary Jane is due for another change.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Following is a brief summary of some of the results of American voters' choices last night on pot initiatives:

2012
State Ballot Initiatives

Updated: November 7, 2012

Arkansas

•Arkansas
Medical Marijuana Question – sought
to legalize marijuana under the guise of medicine and allow for the
establishment of marijuana dispensaries licensed by the state. The question was
sponsored by Arkansans for Compassionate Care. Defeated - 52% opposed 48% supported.

•Initiative
64 The Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol –initiative
allows those 21 years of age and older to possess up to one ounce of marijuana
and cultivate six marijuana plants. The initiative also allows for
over-the-counter sale of marijuana, reduces penalties for larger possession
charges and legalizes hemp farming.Passed-
55% supported 45% opposed.

Massachusetts

•Question
Three– legalizes marijuana under the
guise of medicine and allows for the establishment of marijuana dispensaries. Passed – 63% supported
37% opposed.

Washington

•Initiative
502 – allows adults 21 and
over to purchase marijuana from state-licensed and state-regulated businesses.
Creates a regulatory system, much like the liquor control system, in which a
board oversees licensing of marijuana producers, processors and retailers, and
imposes an excise tax of 25% at each step. Passed – 56% supported 44% opposed.

In local addictions mythology, The Four Pillars is considered the Holy Grail: Harm Reduction, Enforcement, Prevention and Treatment.

Most citizens have long acknowledged that, from the beginning and in reality, there has only been one pillar - Harm Reduction - and three matchsticks, which are either underfunded or outright maligned.

Many continue to believe that Enforcement and Treatment are natural enemies.

They are not.

Please read this recent study from Scotland which casts a much healthier and optimistic light on the subject.

Endorsement

"All treatment centres in B.C. should get involved and support the Drug Prevention Network. As one collective voice we need to send the message that treatment works and it saves lives. There are recovery houses, treatment centers, private, government funded, long term, short term, detox, therapeutic communities etc. Let's help support prevention and help educate the public."